


Glory Days

by yekoc



Series: Post Script [2]
Category: Love Simon (2018), Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda - Becky Albertalli
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Third Person POV, Young Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-08
Updated: 2018-05-08
Packaged: 2019-05-03 21:49:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14578380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yekoc/pseuds/yekoc
Summary: “Bram’s,” Simon says. “Bram--Bram Greenfeld,” and he doesn’t look at them when he says it, but there’s something new in his voice, something so tender Jack bites back his instinctive joke.He wants to do this better than he did before.





	Glory Days

**Author's Note:**

> This is a short sequel to [Post Script](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14281389), from Jack Spier's POV. It will make more sense if you read that (slight AU) story first, but could probably be read alone without too much confusion.

When Simon calls them at midnight on the night of Prom, asking if he can drive out to some cabin in the middle of the state for the weekend, Jack grabs the phone before Emily can tell Simon no.

“Who’s driving?” he asks, then, “Has he been drinking?”

When he gets a desperately sincere negative in response, he tells Simon to go for it. 

“Be good, kid,” he says. “We’ll see you Sunday.”

He hangs up and braces himself for Emily’s worried exasperation, which she has a right to. Parenting should be collaborative; he had no proof that this Garrett kid wasn’t actually drinking, except the experience of years of seeing through Simon’s best attempts at lies; Simon does still have a curfew, technically.

But when Emily sees the look on his face, she sighs and lets it go. 

“You don’t have to keep beating yourself up, you know,” she says to him. 

“I just think the kid should have a good prom night,” Jack says. He’s not beating himself up, okay? It’s just that-- “He deserves it.” 

“Come here,” says Emily, and she puts her arm around him. Jack leans into the familiar comfort of her shoulder. 

“So who’s going to this cabin with him, anyway?” she asks. 

“Garrett, who has never touched alcohol in his life, is driving,” Jack says. He tries to remember the rest of the names Simon had shoved at him in a hopeful rush. “Leah, of course. Nick, that new one, Abby. And the kid whose cabin it is--Bran?”

“Bram?” Emily asks, curious. Jack turns his head to look at her.

“I think so?” he says. “Do we know him? Should I know him? Is he a drug dealer, or something?” 

Emily laughs, but she’s got that thoughtful light in her eyes. “Not a drug dealer, no. I just--wasn’t that the kid that came over to do that strange English project with Simon? The one that was a creative essay about fossils?”

“Sounds right,” says Jack, and there’s a flare of recognition--he remembers that day, anyway. He should have shown Simon his fossil collection years ago, come to think of it. Although--

“He never did show us that essay,” Jack realizes.

Emily laughs again. 

“I kind of think that it’s possible there wasn’t an essay,” she says. 

“If he was curious about my fossils, he didn’t need to make up an excuse,” Jack says. “I’d show them to him any time. Probably thought it wasn’t cool, you know, showing interest in one of his dad’s hobbies.”

Emily rubs his neck, then leans over and kisses him on the cheek. 

“Oh, babe,” she says, the way she does when there’s something he’s not getting. “I’ll look at your fossils anytime.”

“Is that an innuendo?” Jack asks, hopeful, and she laughs and kisses him. 

***

Simon comes home Sunday afternoon, and Jack hadn’t known how worried about him he really was until he sees him there in the doorway, tired and grinning, and knows somehow, suddenly, that he’s okay. 

He’d thought Simon was better after he came out, after they muddled through the disaster of Christmas and his own idiocy. He’d talked to Emily about it, and she’d agreed. Simon had been less closed off, less silent. 

This Simon, though, is _happy_ , glowing with it in a way Jack has only seen glimpses of over the past few months. When he grabs him up in a hug, Simon hugs him back, warm and sure. 

“Good trip?” Jack asks, around the sudden choke of emotion in his throat. It’s just--it’s his boy. 

“Yeah,” Simon says, and his mouth twists around like he doesn’t know what to do with that big grin. 

They have dinner, Nora’s famous tacos, and Simon eats five, then another two. He tells them about prom, which sounds like it hasn’t changed much in the last few decades, and about his trip. 

“Did you eat anything except sugar?” Emily asks, but she’s smiling. 

“There’s not a lot of places to eat around there,” Simon says. “Apparently usually they bring food, but it was kind of a spur-of-the-moment trip, so.”

“Whose idea was this?” Jack asks, because he should thank whoever it was, or their parents. For letting Simon have this, with his friends. 

“Bram’s,” Simon says. “Bram--Bram Greenfeld,” and he doesn’t look at them when he says it, but there’s something new in his voice, something so tender Jack bites back his instinctive joke. He wants to do this better than he did before. 

Across the table, Emily is trying not to smile. She’s looking at Simon just the way she always does, like she loves him so much she can’t contain all of it. Jack knows the feeling. 

“Is he the one who came over to work on that English paper with you?” she asks, and--oh. _Oh_.

“Um,” Simon says. He stares into his tacos for a long second and then he swallows and looks up.

“Yeah,” he says. He straightens his shoulders just a little bit. When he tells them he’s dating Bram, he’s sure, and proud, and that new tender thing is there too, warm and happy. 

That’s my guy, Jack thinks, looking at Simon. Simon looks back at him, meets his eye. There you are. 

***

Making Simon sound like that, look like that, is already big points in this kid Bram’s favor, but Jack still wants to _meet_ him. He wasn’t around the day of the now-famous English paper, never got to vet the kid. He feels like it’s a critical part of parenthood, getting to loom a little. Intimidate, maybe. Just a tiny bit.

So he’s all ready to be the tough guy the first time Bram comes over to--“he’s just going to pick me up for ice cream, _please_ don’t be weird about this”--take Simon out. On a date. It’s his right as a father, okay? 

But when the kid--Bram--sticks his hand out on the doorstep, before he’s even inside, and says, “It’s so nice to meet you, Mr. Spier,” in a nervous rush, Jack’s saying, “please, call me Jack,” before he can help it.

It’s just that he’s so even though he’s so young--this skinny black kid with big eyes and a gentle face--he doesn’t have any of the fake, calculated swagger Jack had practiced so hard, when he was eighteen. Instead, despite his evident nervousness, there’s a kind of shy calm confidence right under the surface. It feels real. Jack trusts it. 

“Don’t stay out too late, okay?” is all the intimidation he can muster, in the end. 

“You’re soft on Simon, these days,” Emily says, when he’s waved them out the door. “You don’t have to keep making up for it, I keep telling you. He gets it.”

“It’s not that,” Jack says, and it isn’t. Mostly. He still wishes he could turn back time and do it all over, not just Christmas but everything, the last--five years. Ten. Fifteen. He knows it wasn’t like he was a monster or anything, but he also knows he made things harder for Simon. He never, ever wants to make things harder for his kid. 

“Just, you know,” he says. “It’s tough enough, figuring all of this out. It was for me.”

“Dating?” Emily asks.

“Yeah,” Jack tries to explain. “I was just--he reminded me of me, you know? Not in any obvious way. But I remember what it felt like to walk up to your door, that first time.” 

He does remember, like it was yesterday. Not just the thrill of Emily, herself, but the terrifying understanding that these people loved her, and if he wanted anything to do with her he’d be better off if he could get them to love him, too. 

“Must have been even harder for Bram,” Emily says, thoughtfully. “There’s a lot of new stuff for us, in him. He probably knows that.” 

Jack tries to imagine what it would have been like to walk up to Emily’s door and not know that he’d look like her family, that he’d celebrate the same holidays and believe in the same things, for the most part. That he was probably exactly what they’d always expected, hoped for, in all of the structural ways. 

“Yeah,” he says. 

When the boys get back that night, Jack’s not above sneaking a glance out the window before Simon gets to the door. To his surprise, Bram comes to the door too, though--walks Simon all the way up the front yard, then lingers. Jack can see them talking, but he can’t hear what they’re saying. He sees the way their fingers curl against each other, though, the way Bram presses a kiss to Simon’s cheek before Simon leans back in to kiss him once, quickly, on the lips. 

They say a few more things, and then Simon’s key is turning in the lock.

Jack has one more chance, so he flies in for the interception, opens the door before Simon can.

“Good timing, guys,” he says, and ignores Simon’s embarrassed eye-rolling. 

He looks at Bram. Bram bites his lip, a little, but he doesn’t look away. 

“It’s good to meet you, Bram,” he says. “Next time, come on in, okay? You’re always welcome here.” 

Bram nods, and gives him a small smile. He looks at Simon once more before he turns to go, and the look is so familiar it knocks all the air out of Jack, a hard tackle. It’s the way he used to feel, when he had to walk away from Emily. Every time.

“Hey, Bram?” he says, in a rush, and Bram turns back to him.

“We’re--we’re really glad,” he says, and he hopes that’ll do it, because he can feel his throat getting tight.

“Thanks,” Bram says, and his smile is bigger this time, and it’s all for Simon, red-faced in the doorway. Jack doesn’t begrudge him any part of it.

***

Bram comes around more, after that, and he hangs out at the house, too, which is good. Jack likes him a lot, he realizes, not just as a good person for Simon but as a person in his own right. He’s polite, and smart, and quietly, tentatively funny. It’s more than that, though--they just get along, him and Bram. 

Bram likes sports a lot more than Simon or Emily or Nora do, for one thing. Jack knows--he _knows_ there are still a bunch of messed-up assumptions he has to work out, should have worked out even without a gay son, but still, he’ll admit it, it never occurred to him that his gay son would come with a boyfriend who’d sit down on the couch and watch the NBA playoffs with him for two hours. 

“Really?” he’s asking Bram, teasing him, because he just likes the kid, likes to watch him stammer and laugh. “ _LeBron_? I thought LeBron was old hat, these days. Aren’t all you kids into Curry? Westbrook?”

“No, it’s just--” Bram says, and laughs. “Okay, I just think it’s cool that LeBron’s been playing for so long and he’s not just still good--great--he’s just, he’s never had any scandals, never done anything crazy off the court. He just works hard and cares about basketball, there’s no drama besides the Miami thing, that _one_ thing, he just wants to be the best at his game and he does it, it’s really cool to see--”

“Whoa, whoa,” Jack says, laughing. “Okay, I concur! I get it! You’ll never convince me he’s better than Jordan, but sure, he’s acceptable for a favorite player. At least until the Hawks get some superstar in the draft.” 

He’s impressed, though. He’s thought about it that way before, sure, that the most admirable thing about a superstar could be the person they were just as much as the way they performed, but he wouldn’t have thought it at eighteen. 

“Soon, I hope,” Bram says, sighing with the impatience of an eighteen-year-old who can’t wait even another year for his team to put it all together. 

“Please stop stealing him,” Simon says, long-suffering, poking his head in from the kitchen where he’s helping Nora with something. “Bram, you know you don’t have to do this with him, right? He’ll still like you even if you don’t watch all his sports with him, or whatever.”

Bram looks between the two of them, and Jack knows where he’d rather be--with Simon, always. The game’s a blowout, anyway.

“Go on,” he says, but as Bram and Simon head back into the kitchen Jack can hear him whispering to Simon, “It’s kind of nice--I miss watching the games with my dad, we’d always--”

The next weekend, Simon joins them on the couch for the whole game. He’s on his phone half the time, but his feet are tucked up under Bram’s thigh, and Jack can see that he’s happy. 

That night, Emily reaches over to turn out the light and says, in the dark, “Honey, I think you should have another talk with Simon. You know, as his dad.”

Oh, god. “We did the sex talk,” Jack says, defensively. “We did it in seventh grade! Then we did it again in ninth grade! Please, tell me I don’t have to do it again.”

It’s too dark to see, but Jack just _knows_ Emily is giving him that look. 

“For one thing, those talks were based on some premises that don’t exactly apply anymore,” she says, “and you know that. I know we said we wouldn’t do this to him right after he came out, and I agreed with you that it wasn’t the right moment to start lecturing him about STDs. But honey, Bram’s been over a lot lately, and they’re supposed to keep the door open but I’d really not have to worry about policing it, and I’d just feel better trusting them if you talked to Simon first--just about the emotional stuff, mostly. I think he needs that. He’s--he’s in pretty deep, I think.”

Jack thinks about it. He can do it, he knows. It’ll be weird--it was weird enough the first two times, and he was able to speak from experience then--but they’ll get through it. Jack can focus on what Emily’s talking about, the stuff that’s universal. Being kind, figuring things out together. Taking time to enjoy the newness of things while they're still new. 

It won’t be hard, he doesn’t think. He remembers Bram’s insistence that his favorite player be trustworthy, steady, good. He thinks about Simon’s adamant declaration, just that morning, that he’d been wanting to watch basketball all week, _really_ , Bram. 

They already want to take care of each other. He’ll give Simon another talk, if Emily thinks he should, but Jack’s pretty sure that most of the work’s been done for him. 

***

Still, he feels better knowing that he also thrust a few more condoms into Simon’s mortified hands when he gets back from grocery shopping on the same day Emily’s taking Nora to get a new bathing suit at the mall--an all-day adventure, and one he carefully avoids--and sees Bram’s gym bag lying in the front hall.

He’s allowed over any time, whether or not Jack and Emily are home, but this is the first time Jack hasn’t come back to find Bram curled up watching junk cartoons with Simon on the couch, or lying around reading in the backyard. The house is quiet, just the hum of the A/C units. His footsteps echo a little, on the stairs.

Simon’s door is cracked open, even though technically they’ve let that rule go. Jack’s not above taking advantage, though, and he scoots it open a little wider, peers in. Just to check.

They’re both in there, in Simon’s bed, fast asleep. They’ve got shirts on, which Jack notes absently--the sheets are pooled around their waists, and he can see that Simon’s hair is damp at the temples, the way it gets when he sleeps, like it always has ever since he was a little kid. Bram has one arm stretched under his pillow, lying half on his back, and Simon’s body curves against him, head resting on Bram’s chest. 

Bram’s fingers are in Simon’s hair, curled there. They breathe together, softly, in the still summer afternoon. 

Jack tiptoes back out, and closes the door gently. He doesn’t want to wake them. 

***

Jack Spier has always thought he had a pretty good love story, all things considered. It’s very Hallmark card, sure: star quarterback, valedictorian, big house, two cute kids. A dog. But that doesn’t mean that it hasn’t been fantastic, start to finish. After all, how many guys can look at their wife after almost thirty years and still feel the same kind of rush they got at eighteen? Not that many, at least not if you ask the guys around his office. It’s what he’s always hoped for for his kids, too--this kind of simple happiness, the everyday joy he gets from the person who shares his life. 

Jack’s spent a long time assuming that that kind of happiness had to look a certain way. He spent a long time making that assumption clear to Simon, too--too clear. And now, it’s not that he’s trying to make up for it by being soft on Simon and Bram, at least not the way that Emily thinks. It’s not like he thinks he can fix it. 

It’s just that--he’s getting to watch as Simon re-writes all of that, right before his eyes. It looks so different than Jack’s but feels exactly the same, echoes with it. 

The nervous handshake at the door, the way they can’t look away from each other. Summer goodbyes on front porches, and the way Simon’s hand rests against Bram’s back when they’re hanging out in the kitchen with Nora. Two sleeping boys, wrapped up in each other. All of it--it’s all he ever wanted for Simon, and he gets to watch Simon have it, gets to be here for this beginning.

“Have you been crying?” Emily asks when she gets home, concerned, and Jack doesn’t say anything, just wraps Nora up in a hug until she squeals and runs away. 

He’s a lucky man, that’s all.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the Bruce Springsteen song of the same name, because I thought to myself, "What would Jack Spier listen to when he was feeling nostalgic?"
> 
> Bonus poem, for Jack Spier: [The Bee](http://gonemild.com/2009/05/24/sunday-poetry-the-bee-by-james-dickey/), by James Dickey.


End file.
